


I Could Wait a Thousand Hours

by DetectiveRoboRyan



Category: Fire Emblem Echoes: Mou Hitori no Eiyuu Ou | Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia, Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Shin Monshou no Nazo | Fire Emblem: New Mystery of the Emblem
Genre: Angst, Bar fights, Canon Compliant, Character Study, Drama, Est is way too young to get married, Everyone Is Gay, F/F, Family, Fluff, Includes Art, Post-Canon, Reading Together, Sister-Sister Relationship, Story within a Story, and then shoved out the window, anyway this is that taken to a logical extreme, fire emblem why did you do that to her, like a well-meaning goose babysitting a human toddler, roman numerals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-16
Updated: 2017-10-16
Packaged: 2019-01-15 17:24:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,648
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12325491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DetectiveRoboRyan/pseuds/DetectiveRoboRyan
Summary: Est, her sisters, and Valentia-- and what happens after.I-XXIII + XXX





	I Could Wait a Thousand Hours

**Author's Note:**

> let them kiss intsys
> 
> art is mine

I.

The week after Est's sixteenth birthday, she marries her boyfriend quietly, with very little to-do about it. The day they announce it, Palla breaks her new husband's jaw.

It's a good punch. The force of it knocks Abel over, leaves him lying on the ground clutching his snapped mandible. Catria pulls Est aside and quietly asks if she's alright— if she's being put up to this, if she's being manipulated, if something is going on with Abel that she doesn't feel safe discussing with him here. Her heart's in the right place, but Est's mostly focused on the fact that her husband's on the floor spitting out teeth knocked out by the sheer force of Palla's sisterly rage.

The evening doesn't end well. More specifically it ends with Est hauling Abel to the local clinic and getting into a shouting match with her sisters outside the clinic doors, that ends in Palla and Catria leaving with the decision that _well maybe since you think you're mature enough to make a life-changing decision like marrying a man eight years your senior then clearly you're mature enough to handle it all on your own,_ and with _maybe I am, maybe I'll handle it so well I won't need the two of you babying me anymore,_ and with _fine then, fine,_ and with the beating of enormous wings as the two of them take off into the evening.

(The noise echoes in Est's head, pounding against her temples like it's struggling to escape. She and her sisters have disagreed before, but it's never been so explosive, so angry. For the longest time, all they had was each other. It scares Est to think that that's changing because she went out and changed it, scares her more than the noise in her head.)

The crash is always worse than the high, but as terrible as Est feels, there's no way she's going to be the one to reach out again after it was Palla's fault for punching Abel when he didn't even do anything wrong. So she handles it herself, like she said she would.

But Abel's jaw heals and in another two months, he's fine— even if he's lost a few teeth and expects to lose a few more. And Est doesn't know how to run a store, really, but she hasn't run the place into the ground yet, so she assumes she's doing alright. She lets her hair grow until it brushes her shoulders and runs the place alone while Abel rests, and when he's up and about again she's glad to cede the job of counting profits to him. She hangs her lance on the mantlepiece and lets it collect dust, and the war feels a million miles away.

II.

Est learns to cook. She has to, since not only is Abel nursing a broken jaw, he's abysmal in the kitchen anyway. She's not as good at it as Catria— but she'll never be as good at it as Catria. It takes her too long to read the recipes and all the words and numbers have never aligned themselves in her head like Palla tells her Lady Minerva can do like magic. Est doesn't think her head's good for much except for reminding her of her sisters' voices, bitter and angry and cold, but it all fades itself to static after a while.

Still, she tries, and even if her soup tastes more like noodle than chicken, Abel drinks it all up with a smile and nods his thanks. When he can move his jaw again he thanks her for it, and Est, for one, is glad when she can start making something besides soup.

Normalcy is strange. Est grew up hunting and fishing for dinner, helping Catria prepare it with the means that they had, waiting with bated breath for the telltale shape of a pegasus to appear in the evening sky (because that meant Palla was almost home), and there was normalcy in that, but this is different. Here there is no soldiery, there is no war, there are no thoughts of fighting and swearing fealty to one's country. Here is merely Est, and her husband, and a store that sells canning jars and shoe polish and candles and soap. She even gets used to the static, buzzing, aching, pressing from the inside out. Everything fades to background noise eventually.

She kind of likes it— Abel's hometown. His parents are a street away, and they like her, though she's not dense enough to not notice the furrow in his mother's brow when she tells them how old she is. They're old, brown and wrinkly like a pair of little walnuts, with silver hair and tufty eyebrows. Est has never thought much about being old, but when it sinks in that being married means, ideally, she'll grow old and get wrinkly and arthritic in the same town and the same store with the same man, her stomach lurches. Maybe she's coming down with something.

Everyone keeps telling her she's still young. She's not sure if she believes them after a while.

III.

The months pass. They were married in the summer, married the week after Est turned sixteen, and as the summer moves along, routine turns to monotony and monotony turns into relentless boredom that makes it all feel like a chore— what was once idle fidgeting turns into itchy restlessness like Abel's little shop is a heavy wool coat two sizes too small, and Est feels a scratching at the back of her neck like she's not meant to be here. She cuts her hair short again, shorter than it was, in a vain hope it'll help. The static remains.

She tells Abel about it— because that's what husbands and wives do, is they talk to each other— but Abel only shrugs and says _that's rough, I'm sorry to hear that,_ and Est, immensely unsatisfied, decides Abel's useless for emotional conversations.

On a day where Est's weeding her miserable little tomato plants and everybody who stops by the store asks for coolng charms, the sky's clear and blue. Est watches it, feels the late summer breeze card its fingers through her hair like an old friend. Like Palla used to, before the big blowup when Est ruined it all. She can still hear the sound over the static if she thinks about it, like a spike of pain amidst the ache.

Her hands stiffen around her watering can when Abel musses her hair. She startles, then forces herself to look at him. He's leaning on the fence, looking at her thoughtfully.

"I kind of liked you with your hair long," he comments. "You look more like a boy with it short."

"It was ugly long, and you know it," Est replies, forcing the sting of his latter sentence to dissipate, melt away because it doesn't matter, it doesn't _matter_.

The wind blows. Est pulls away from Abel's touch, faces the wind leaning on the fence on the other side of the garden. It's a pathetic little garden compared to the miracles Palla worked on that little plot of soil next to their childhood home. Her tomatoes are pitifully small, but it's too late to plant something better. (Catria would know what to do. Catria _always_ knows what to do.)

"Summer's nearly over," Abel observes. "We should start stockpiling firewood for when the weather cools. Seal up the cracks in the roof, that sort of thing…"

He keeps talking. The wind traces Est's face, still round with a stubborn bit of baby fat that refuses to go away, rough with pockmarks that she sometimes scratches at idly despite knowing it'll make them scar, marked with a tiny bit of pinkish scruff that she can't seem to get when she goes at it with a razor in the morning. She knows in her gut that her pegasus can feel the wind, too— knows he's shuffling, impatient, wishing as much as Est to feel that wind under his wings like he used to when Est still had the time to take him flying.

The yearning tugs at the very marrow of her bones. Her hands tighten around the rough grain of the garden fence. Perhaps getting into the air will clear her head.

"I'm going flying," Est decides. "Don't wait for me for dinner. I'll be back later tonight." She doesn't stay around long enough for Abel to protest.

It's cold in the sky. She wraps her scarf tight around her face, pulls her hat low over her head and ears, buttons her coat up tight. She takes a sandwich of herb bread and salt pork and pickles (not as good as Catria's, but nothing could be as good as Catria's) and tucks it into her old hunting bag that she doesn't have a use for anymore but keeps anyway. It feels like she's leaving but she's not, she promises Abel while she saddles up her pegasus. She'll be back after dinner. She just needs to fly.

Abel waves her goodbye. He can't keep her from this.

IV.

The other side of the bed is empty when he wakes the next morning. The stable, likewise, smells of horse but has no horse in it, flying or otherwise. Est's coat is still gone from the coatrack. There is no sign of her.

Abel waits another day, just in case.

She's not back the next morning. Abel takes out his oft-neglected stationary and pens a letter to Macedon.

V.

There are bags under Palla's eyes. There've been bags under Palla's eyes since they stopped talking to Est in the summer, but Catria thinks they're worse now that Est's missing, she left and didn't come back and Palla's mind is rapidly assuming the worst.

Perhaps it's for the best they've found nothing— nothing from scouring Archanea toe to tip save for brief rumors of a skinny little pegasus rider with pink hair, pointing her north, west, east. Catria marks the spots on the map she carries and connects them into a course, a course that ends in a port town where an old dock worker says he spotted someone like that with a group boarding a ship bound west. _Though she ain't had nothing like a pegasus,_ he says, it's the best lead they have. Catria relays the information to Palla while Palla's staring emptily at the scum in the bottom of a tankard.

Of course Palla blames herself. What else would she do? Catria sometimes hears her muttering while she rubs that little brass locket she always carries, quiet apologies to a mother Catria never had a chance to know. Catria lets her mumble and lets her hang her head, while Catria's mind replays the shouting of the last summer. _Maybe I don't need you_ in Est's voice, so colored with anger, and _maybe you don't,_ so bitter and cold in Catria's.

The words taste like bile in her throat. Catria grits her teeth and squints into the sun glaring off the ocean a quarter-mile below her. It's cold in the sky, and the wind off the ocean seems to cut right through her coat and her sweater below it. In front of her, Palla's pegasus Bluebell spreads her wings wide and proud, catching a thermal that rises from an island below, and makes the flapping of her lumpy wool scarf Catria made seven years ago change ever so slightly.

Likewise, Catria tugs at her reins. Juniper nickers, lifting up just a bit with the bubble of warmer air. Catria still can't see anything on the western horizon, but Palla's the one with the spyglass.

Palla puts the spyglass down. She holds up two spread forefingers with her thumb set at the dip between them— another twenty miles to the mainland, then— and tucks the spyglass back into her coat. Catria squints. She still sees nothing.

Palla pops the stiff joints in her back when they land in a port city on the mainland. They stick out like a pair of sore thumbs— tall and visibly foreign and with two winged horses. Catria chews on her short, ragged thumbnail the way she used to when she was younger, an old nervous habit she'd kicked but that's cropped back up during the search. While Palla takes a look around, Catria stays with the pegasi.

In short order, Palla pushes back through the crowd. It's easy to see— she's a spot of green, bobbing around in a sea of people half a head shorter. The look in her eyes that Catria can see when she shoulders past a fishmonger with a redheaded Valentian girl in tow tells her that she has a lead.

The redhead is Celica, and she's a traveling priestess for some religion or another Catria isn't familiar with. She looks about Est's age (maybe a little older), though that's where the similarities end. Celica's shorter, sunburned on her arms and face, and though she swaggers like a sailor, there's an air about her that feels carefully cultivated, like she's putting up a front. But then, Catria barely knows this girl.

"I haven't seen any pegasi around," Celica tells them. "But if you're looking for someone who's been kidnapped, it seems a man named Grieth is in charge of that."

The word _Grieth_ sinks into Catria's mind like it'd been branded, and by the way Palla mouths the name to commit it to memory, it's the same for her.

Catria feels her hands shake. It's the closest they've been since they began the search— thrilling, yet all she can think of is what they'll find. She was half-expecting to come across a body rotting in a vacant field, clawed apart in the forest, face down in a lake, twisted and broken at the bottom of a gorge. Catria will admit, privately, that she's more scared of what happens if they find Est than what happens if they never do.

Palla catches sets a hand on her shoulder while she's tightening the straps on their saddlebags. She rubs her arm, leans over and kisses her head like she's kissing her goodnight like always. (Always— Palla may have worked a lot, but she never skipped that. Not even now, when Catria's twenty and Est's six months from seventeen.)

"We'll find her," Palla promises, with certainty in her voice that, despite everything, helps calm Catria's nerves.

"I'm almost more worried what'll happen if we _do_ ," Catria mumbles. Almost is an understatement. "What if she's—" Her throat closes and won't let her finish her sentence.

"Then we bring her home, same as ever," Palla replies. "She deserves that much, don't you think?"

Palla always knows what to say. This time is no different. It does, at least, help to quell the trembling in Catria's hands.

VI.

The trail waxes and wanes. For months, they search— they get done what they can when it's hot, and keep ears to the ground when it's cold. The fall turns into winter, winter into spring. Palla pens letters to Archanea, keeping their worried friends updated, and only wishes she could receive updates back. In another life, Catria teases her about writing Macedon, in particular, so often— but in a life where she can do that, Est isn't missing, so what would be the point?

In another month, they repeat their routine in another little town. It's Palla's turn to ask around, so she's asking a mercenary company in the leaky little tavern if they've heard anything of Grieth or of Est in their travels. Catria waits outside with Bluebell and Juniper. It's perfectly normal until Catria starts hearing glass breaking and tables smashing inside, and six bar patrons run, one by one, out of the tavern.

Palla's last, when the noise quiets, and she leaves with a bruised nose and a split lip and blood on her knuckles. She grumbles something nasal about setting someone straight, until Catria raises an eyebrow.

"So baybe I starded id," Palla admits, taking a wrinkly handkerchief and sponging the blood from her lip and nose.

"You're not one to start bar fights," Catria replies.

"Basdard said we shud give up," Palla grumbles. "Youd've hit hib, too."

She's right. Catria says nothing, but takes her elbow and leads her to the local clinic.

VII.

Four months. Nothing.

VIII.

Six months. Est hears the noise in her head and the ache sharpens with her heartbeat. She's never missed home so much before.

IX.

During the peak of the summer season, they meet up with the redhead from the harbor again. Her pilgrimage— since that's what it is— has grown in size. It's an odd sort of pilgrimage, Catria thinks, that leads its pilgrims to the citadel of a kidnapper in order to take down the country-wide crime ring, but she supposes that's none of her business since she's never been on a pilgrimage.

But Celica's helped them before, so they stick with her for the time being. If nothing else, she pays well and she seems determined to follow through— if the glare in her eye when she squints through the sand at the citadel in the distance is anything to go on. Catria takes it as a sign of her determination and defers to her orders when terrors rise from the shifting sands and witches materialize from the air.

Celica deals the final blow in the battle against one of Grieth's lieutenants, clearing the northern path for travel. The peaks of the citadel loom in the distance, flags streaming from the tips. She shakes the blood from her sword and it spatters red-brown on the hot sand.

"Est's in there," Palla murmurs to her, while the rest of the army regroups and makes camp after the difficult battle. Her eyes are set, grim and determined, on the fortress. She looks like she's an inch from charging in there herself, spear gleaming, a whirl of deadly beauty and gray pegasus feathers.

"What if she's not?" Catria finds herself asking. She can't ignore the tremolo in her voice, the quivering in her hands around her spear.

Palla purses her lips. She's not thinking about that. She's not thinking about what'll happen if it's a dead end— the despair, the denial, the starting all over again with a new lead. The pitying look Celica will give them when she offers her condolences. It'll feel like she's trying to make it all better with a few hollow little words even though they know that's not what she's doing, but that's still how it feels. How could any words make up for the tragedy, the hopelessness? How could any words even hope to pick up the pieces of their family?

"She is," Palla says. "I can feel it."

"You're just saying that," Catria replies.

"Maybe." Palla shrugs. "That's all I can do."

She's right. _Palla's always right,_ Catria remembers, with a wry smile to herself. She thinks it again, swinging herself into Juniper's saddle.

X.

_Commander,_

_We found her. Coming home soon. Tell others she's safe, so long as I have anything to say about it._

_P. Skylark_

XI.

Est's a week past seventeen. It's the anniversary of the day she married Abel, but that's the furthest thing from her mind. She feels the stony chill of the dungeon like it's seeped into her bones even though they rolled out the washtub and let her scrub away the grime like sanding the splinters off a block of wood. She scrapes the dirt out from under her nails with her teeth, chews off the ragged ends and spits them onto the stone floor next to her. Though the weight of her fingernails is negligible at best, it feels different having the pads of her fingers thud dully on hard surfaces instead of hearing a pleasing click like she did when her nails were long.

She scratches at her face, at the still-healing starburst scar beside her left eye, with the nubs of her nails that remain. Her face isn't soft, not anymore, and her cheeks are sunken and paler than they used to be. The noise is a dull roar in her head like scraping chains and distant shouting and the wind outside when sandstorms howl and blast dust in through the little dungeon window. She'd hoped it'd quiet when she found her sisters again, but it hasn't. She still hears it. It still aches. It still hurts.

She's not ready to fly yet— not physically ready, and her lungs aren't strong enough to whistle loud enough for Pepperjack to hear. She needs to gain back what she lost in fat reserves before she picks up her lance again, pull her wasting muscles back into gear. Celica's healer hasn't seen her yet, but she's busy with the two younger boys that were in the dungeon— the brothers that Est loaned her now-shabby coat and sweater to when the desert nights got cold. They gave them back, but they're not going to do Est much good. (Est remembers their names— Daven and Jory. Sweet kids. Est's glad they're going home safe.)

The sunshine is bright against her eyes, wooden bowl of hot soup warm in her hands, but even with the quilt Palla put around her shoulders and the thick robe she's borrowing (who owned it, Est will never know), she feels cold. She wonders if she'll ever stop feeling cold. Maybe cold is constant now, just like the noise.

She doesn't notice when Catria sits next to her, not until Catria takes her skinny hand to examine her nails and tsks.

"You've bitten them all down to the nail beds," Catria chides, so familiar and yet it feels wrong, achingly wrong when Est compares it to the last words she heard from Catria. "I wish you hadn't. Then we could file them down into something healthier."

"Sorry I've been rotting in a dungeon instead of taking care of my nails," Est replies, voice hoarse. It sounds deeper when it's hoarse, like she has a cold, and it always goes up three octaves when it cracks at the ends of her sentences.

Catria gives her a wry look, and lets go of her hand. Est picks up her spoon and stirs her hearty soup with it. It's got potatoes and carrots that used to be dried, and some herbs Est can't name, and the meat bits and stock of some bird Est doesn't know. It's too gamey to be chicken. Maybe she's better off not knowing.

"I finally got Palla to get some rest," Catria says next. "She was going to collapse if she kept fussing over you."  
  
Est wants to snort and make a joke about how Palla's _always_ preened, like a mother bird plucking the stray feathers off her fledglings, but somehow the mood seems wrong for that. Not somber, quite, but serious. Like there are things yet unsaid that hang too heavy in the air for humor to dispel.

"Yeah," Est hums. "I'm kind of glad. I missed it."

She feels a lump in her throat. She's looking away, but out of the corner of her eye, she sees Catria press her fist to her mouth, rub at the mist in her eyes with the heel of her calloused hand.

Est sets her bowl of soup aside and leans over, pressing her shoulder to Catria's. Catria takes the invitation and hugs her tight, pressing a kiss to her head that Est didn't know she'd miss so much. What Est wouldn't have given to have her sisters there in Abel's town, on those nights she tried to count out change and felt like pounding her useless head against the counter because she's never been one for numbers, or when she woke at night from phantoms pressing their fingers against her neck and her temples and made the tears stream down her face while the dreams, though vivid at the time, faded to senses of fear and unease.

"I'm sorry," Est manages. "I was wrong. I th-thought I knew what I was doing, but I _didn't_ , and n-nothing felt right, and—"

Catria shakes her head. "Don't," she says, croak in her voice making it sound harsher than Est knows she means it. "You're _here_. You're _safe_. That's what matters."

And she's right. Catria, Est knows, is always right.

XII.

Palla sits with her when she goes to sleep on one of the extra cots. Catria's next to her, almost like when they were children and slept in a pile in the lower bed. Est pretends to be asleep, breathing slowly through her nose, and does her best not to stiffen or react in any way that'd tell Palla she's awake.

It's nice, though. Est pushes back her tears— she's already cried enough to lose a pound she can't afford to lose— and rests, listening to Catria's breathing and feeling the gentleness of Palla's hands as they pull the blanket up closer, as they tuck it around Est like she's tucking her into bed.

XIII.

The Pilgrimage— that's what they've been calling it— has one actual medic that can use healing magic and about four other volunteers that can do everything short of that. The medic's name is Genny, she's Est's junior by about a year, she never raises her voice except for very special occasions, and when Est lays eyes on her, everything goes quiet.

She takes note of Est's vital signs. Est, on the low cot behind a curtain they've rigged up to mark off the field infirmary, has never felt barer while being fully dressed. Est feels her callouses press against the wood frame of the cot while Genny's pen scratches against her parchment, marking down heartbeat, breathing, temperature. She's just lucky Est isn't too flushed from Genny's hands at her neck checking her pulse, because it'd surely throw off her recordings.

It's quiet. The noise is gone, dissolved into Genny's pen scratching and Est's blunt fingertips drumming on the stool because she never was content to keep still. Est wants to soak in it, feel the silence seeping into her skin like the noise was a shield that kept out its soothing balm.

XIV.

They leave the desert in short order. Nobody likes it there— the sand, the dust, the wind. But within the week Est can call for Pepperjack again, and within the week he comes soaring through the sky on the desert winds. Est feels much more at home mounted, and with her sisters, it's almost like old times. Almost.

"We could go back home," Palla suggests. "I told Commander Drakon we'd be home soon now that we found you."

Est hesitates. Home sounds nice— but home for her must be different than it is for her sisters. Home for her would mean Altea and Abel and store shelves and tomato plants. Home would mean she can't see Genny again, can't hear the quiet she's already craving.

"I want to stay," she says, before she knows what she's saying, because Est always speaks before she thinks.

She swallows. "I want to," she repeats, voice stronger. "It— it _feels_ like the right thing to do. You know? I just— _feel_ it," she finishes lamely. "I think this is where we're needed most."

Catria and Palla exchange looks. Est looks at both of them pleadingly, and it feels like a mimicry of situations of simpler days— right to when Catria looks at Est, then back at Palla.

Palla relents. "Fine," she caves. "I'll write another letter."

XV.

Rigel is cold, but Est gets her strength and color back quickly. She gets a new coat and sweater to replace the worn-out ones that smell permanently of rotting straw and dungeon grime by now, ones that actually fit her now that she's grown another four inches, reaching her full height like she was meant to. Now she's tallest in the Pilgrimage, taller than her sisters and taller even than all the men, though she doesn't think she's quite as tall as Commander Drakon. (Nobody can be as tall as Commander Drakon. She's the tallest person Est has ever met, and Est is pretty sure that's the way it'll stay.)

She steals opportunities to be near Genny— helping her carry her medical supplies, mostly. Genny always says _no, no, I couldn't ask you to do that,_ but she always relents when Est smiles and says _good thing I'm offering, then, isn't it?_

Genny writes stories. Long stories, stories about grand adventures and brave heroes. Est listens to her talk about her hero, Sister Genevuire, who is smart and capable and always knows just the right thing to do. Things may be difficult for her, Genny explains, but she's a hero and knows what to do to make it right. Est tells her that life isn't that easy. Genny replies that that's why she writes it that way.

They start reading together. Est likes stories, always has, but she's such a slow reader she never has the time to dedicate to reading. And Genny's stories are wonderful, full of adventure and intrigue, but Est thinks that Genny sounds much more confident when she reads her stories to Est. Even if the Rigelian winds howl outside Genny's tent, they're bundled in blankets in the light of a lantern, Genny's voice is quiet but sure and Est loses herself in the world of brave lady knights and a young chapel girl with the powers of the gods.

XVI.

"So Sister Genevuire is doing this all on her own?" Est says it with a mouthful of honeyed porridge, as Genny's telling her about what she has planned over breakfast. She's lucky Catria's not around, because Catria would tell her to swallow her food before talking. Catria'd be right, but still.

Genny hums. "Well, not exactly. She has friends and such," she says. "But they don't have the Crystal's Blessing, so there's only so much they can do."

"I mean, yeah, okay… I just think she should have a friend, you know?" Because Est's of the opinion, especially now, that doing things all on one's lonesome is overrated. "True companions and such. Isn't that something that's really common in stories?"

"You think so?" Genny's hand pauses in twirling her pencil around her finger. It's a new one, one with painted pink wood encasing the lead. She's jotting down notes in her drafting notebook— a ream of battered paper bound together with string. Est's seen the inside of it. It's full of doodles and pressed flowers and leaves, enough that some of the pages are warped and stained with plant juices. It has the faint sweet scent of meadow grass. It suits Genny, suits her softness.

"Maybe a dragon," Est muses, off-hand fidgeting with a loose thread on the scarf Palla tied around her neck before Est could protest. "Dragons are cool."

"Well…" Genny doesn't seem convinced on the dragon front, but Est can see the gears in her head turning. "I'll figure something out."

 _You always do,_ Est thinks, and doesn't say.

XVII.

Rain soaks through the tent Est shares with her sisters. That's what Rigel's climate is like, wet when it rains and clammy when it doesn't. When it's not raining the humidity makes it unbearable to wear sweaters but the raw temperature and the wind chill makes it unbearable to not wear a sweater. Est hates it, hates it more than she ever has Macedon's coastal summer squalls or the harsh winter storms that blow in from the mountains.

The humidity makes her papers curl. Genny loaned her one of her completed writing notebooks, full of short stories about Sister Genevuire. There are recurring characters that definitely resemble people Est has met, but Est's never been good at picking up on implications, so they remain entirely fictional.

"You're smiling," Catria notes, pausing in her mending of a nasty tear in Est's shirt. Est isn't currently wearing the shirt, but has a spare blanket draped over her bare shoulders instead.

Est hadn't realized. "Hm?" she looks up, releases one half of the pages to rub at her slightly-congested nose and then idly pick at the starburst scar on her cheek. Catria reaches over and swats her hand away. Est becomes aware of her cheeks hurting, and rubs at them with the heel of her hand. "Didn't notice. Is it so strange?"

"I've never seen you smile while reading, is all," Catria replies. Then she pauses. "Come to think of it, I've never seen you read outside school before. And even when we were in school, you hated it."

"Well, this is a little more interesting than what we read in school," Est snorts.

Catria scoots closer to Est's bedroll and leans over her shoulder. "What are you reading, anyway?"

Est holds the book away. Catria leans closer, tossing her mending aside. She's stubborn, but Est's arms are longer. Eventually Catria gives up, and Est's smirks victoriously, putting the book down. Catria seizes her chance and snaps it up.

"Catria," Est whines. "That's Genny's!"

"I'll be careful," Catria promises. "Genny's? What's she reading?"

"It's not reading, it's writing," Est replies. "Genny's letting me read her old stories with Sister Genevuire while she writes new ones."

"I didn't know Genny wrote books," Catria remarks. "And I didn't know you liked to read."

"It's different, it's Genny," Est insists.

Catria smirks. "Different?"

"I like Genny," Est shrugs. "She makes everything quiet."

Catria hums. She's still smiling craftily, as if she's figured out something she doesn't want Est to know, but still wants to let Est know she knows something she doesn't. "Alright," she says. She doesn't elaborate, but Est doesn't ask her to.

XVIII.  
  
Genny's latest story is about a knight who rides a pegasus. She's tall and strong and has twilight-violet hair and ocean-blue eyes, and she enters Sister Genevuire's life by swooping in on her steed's feathered wings and saving her from a nasty encounter with a horde of goblins.

"Is this like when I pulled you out of that swamp with the terrors?" Est asks. Genny's cheeks flush a brighter pink than Est's hair. "I mean, I'm not great with noticing things that aren't said. But I'm pretty sure I said that exact thing."

Genny mumbles faintly and fiddles with her soft pink curls. "Maybe I t-took a little inspiration," she whispers, looking like she wants to crawl into a hole and wait for death.

Est goes back to the story. "Ser Astra's so cool," she remarks. "How can one person be so selfless, humble, and brave all at once?"

"That's what heroes do," Genny replies. "And Ser Astra's a hero.”

"Just like Sister Genevuire!" Est realizes, giving Genny a bright grin. "They're both heroes!"

Genny looks up. Her soft bangs brush her eyes just a little, in a way that makes Est want to reach out and push them back. She gives Est a shy smile, her cheeks turning just a little pinker than they normally are.

"Yeah," she agrees. "Yeah, they're both heroes!”

XIX.

Rigel has fireflies.

They only come out sometimes, when the hazy humidity of the autumn days burns off into cold nights. They're out when the Pilgrimage stops in a little mountain village to restock and to rent out every room the inn has— for which Celica pays generously enough for the innkeeper to toss in a few casks of Rigelian mead because she insists, really, and they weren't going to drink it anyway so they might as well.

It's a night full of well, why not, and Est would be joining in the festivities if Catria let her. But they say she's too young, so Est leaves everyone else to their reverie and finds Genny in one of the rooms at the inn.

Est leans in the doorframe until Genny notices and nods, silently granting access. Est sits down on the lumpy quilt on one of the beds, the one under the window. Genny's sitting with her knees up, back to the headboard, pencil scratching on the paper.

It's quiet. Est can hear the festivities from the ground a floor below them, see the torchlight and the others of the Pilgrimage (those who were old enough to indulge, anyway) mingling freely. If she looks out the window, she can see Palla with a half-full tankard, gesturing animatedly as she talks with a tall woman with purple hair that Est's seen among the group but has never met personally. They're both a bit flushed, but they're in an intense discussion. Est's seen Palla gesture like that before. They're talking about gardening.

"Hey, um, Est," Genny brings up, her little voice soft, soft like satin and dandelion fluff and the wispy curls of her hair. Down below, someone breaks out a violin and music starts floating sweetly through the night air. Est's foot taps without her realizing it.

Est looks over, shifts and leans on the wall. "Mm?"

"So I'm working on the next part of the story with ser Astra, and I'm fleshing out her backstory," Genny says. "How old do you have to be to become a knight?"

Est thinks. "Well, like," she begins. "In my experience, I think they'll let you in as a page when you're real young— I was ten and Catria was thirteen when we signed on, back in Macedon, y'know?— and I got trained and stuff, but I didn't see actual combat 'til I was fourteen… though I guess there were some different circumstances. What with the king fucking over Macedon and Commander Minerva, and pr— King Marth swooping in there like, hi I'm here to make things not terrible anymore, which was neat. Though I didn't sign up with him right when I was fourteen. I stole a sword first."

Genny blinks, and Est realizes she's been rambling. She shuts herself up.

"Ah, sorry," she laughs it off. "You didn't ask for my whole life story. I'll stop."

"No, no, I don't mind," Genny insists. "Um— y-you can keep going, if you want…"

"Nah, it's pretty boring," Est shakes her head. “Probably not nearly as exciting as ser Astra, but, well. Nobody can be as exciting as ser Astra.”

"You're not boring," Genny protests. Then she realizes how that sounds, and blushes. "Th-the story! Stories aren't boring, especially if they're about people! And, um, I like hearing you talk. You have a pretty voice.”

Est's heart flutters. Genny's looking out the window, staring at the flickering torches below. Est's blood rushes like the teenager she is, heartbeat pounding in her ears louder than she'd ever thought she'd hear it. Genny chews her lower lip when shes thinking or focusing, and Est can see the purple bruising and the bitemarks from when she does it too hard. Her face is soft with youth, skin mostly unmarred (lucky her), cheeks round and rosy with her blush. Her teeth, a little crooked and a little too big, worry at the flesh of her lip while her fingers, slender and on hands a little big for her body but still small like little pearls to Est's own, fidget with her pencil. The flickering light of her lamp makes her glow with warmth, from the soft blue knit of her sweater to her pale pink curls, loose and soft as down.

Est's foolish teenage heart wants nothing more than to take her hands and cup Genny's cheeks, run her thumbs over her cheekbones, kiss those soft lips until they're out of breath. She wants to trace her features like they do in books, pull her into her arms and kiss her until the world goes away, tangle with her and soak in the quiet until the sun rises. Her heart beats quicker just thinking of it.

Est has been kissed before— once before, when she and Abel married, quietly and privately. _It's kind of traditional,_ Abel had told her. Then we don't have to, because Abel never once touched her without her say-so, but she'd nodded anyway and he'd shown her how it was done, and that had been Est's first kiss. It'd been something, certainly, but she hadn't felt what she feels with Genny. She hadn't felt desire, felt charge.

She does nothing. "You're pretty, too," she murmurs, a little dreamy.

Genny blinks. "I'm—"

"Pretty cool!" Est blurts, heat rushing to her cheeks. "Pretty cool. Yep."

"Oh." Genny's voice is quiet. She sets her notebook aside and tugs at her sweater, looking like it's taking every nerve in her body to avoid pulling herself into it like a turtle hiding from the world. "W-well, um…"

The tension in the room practically aches. Est fidgets. She's been in situations like this before, too, and they made her want nothing more than to jump on Pepperjack and fly to another continent (been there, done that, she supposes). But can she really? It's _Genny_. Est has found she makes a number of exceptions for Genny, and still isn't quite sure why.

She laughs it off. "It doesn't really matter that much, yeah?" she says, grinning brightly at Genny, who timidly smiles back. Est almost lingers, watching the smile spread across her features. Est would fight a war for that smile, she thinks. She'd uproot her life and leave behind all she'd ever known, over and over again, if she could see that smile every day for the rest of her life.

"I guess not," Genny admits. A tiny bit of pink tongue pokes out, moistens her lips, goes back in. Her eyes glance down at the torchlight below. The music's still going, sweet folk songs that Est doesn't know. She sways her knees to the melody.

"Hey, want to hear about the time I stole a legendary sword?" Est asks. "Maybe it could be material for your story."

"Why did you steal a sword, anyway?" Genny asks in reply, a frown creasing her gentle features.

Est snorts wryly. "Because I was fourteen and thought I was being useful," she replies. "Anyway. So I'll start by establishing that I don't normally steal things like swords— well, I don't normally steal things, _period_ , but that's neither here nor there…"

XX.

Genny blows heat into her hands. They lag behind the rest of the march, walking behind one of the supply wagons, if only to have a little privacy. They're so far north that the only sign it's winter is the four-hour days, which is odd, but Est gets used to it like she gets used to everything.

The journey's still going. Est's found her rhythm astride Pepperjack, responding to shouted and signaled orders like she never left Prince— sorry, King— Marth's army. Her sisters are still there, Pepperjack still whinnying and responding quick as ever to her orders. The only thing that's changed is the names and the faces, and it's a sobering reminder to Est that no matter who she follows, she'll always be a soldier.

But she doesn't always feel like a soldier. When it's just her and Genny, reading stories or talking or simply being together, she feels like a teenager. She feels quiet, at peace despite it all, and feels like she needn't be moving all the time— like she can sit and exist and the world won't collapse. It's peaceful, and it's a feeling Est craves more than she ever thought she would. (She's too young to feel so tired, everyone older than her will claim. Est knows better. She's seventeen and has seen more than she should.)

But that's neither here nor there. Genny's cold, so Est offers her scarf. It's red, hastily-knit with spare yarn when Catria and Palla were trying to replace Est's old coat and sweater she'd had to wear for nearly a year straight.

"I couldn't," Genny protests. She sniffles, wipes her nose on the knit of her mittens. She's already layered in sweaters and over-robes, and Est's pretty sure that's miss Sonya's furry down cloak clasped under her chin over everything else. The black doesn't suit her. She looks good in blue, though, Est thinks idly. Blue and green and purple.

"I'm not cold," Est insists. She's telling the truth. "Come on. And I don't have magic sapping my body heat."

"Magic fatigue is different from just being cold," Genny says matter-of-factly, but she takes the scarf and winds it around her neck and face anyway. It's long enough she can pull the back up under her hood to cover her ears— extra layers don't hurt. Est's neck feels chilly without it, but it doesn't bother her. She's never been particularly affected by the cold.

"Is that better?" Est asks. Genny nods. Est beams, tucks her hands into the pockets of her heavy sheepskin coat. At this point she kind of thinks her breastplate and pauldrons are redundant, given how many layers Palla insisted upon, but she's so used to the weight she can't not wear them.

Genny fidgets with her mittens again. "Um, Est," she ventures. "You're from Archanea, right? You and your sisters?"

Est nods. "Sure am. Why d'you ask?"

Heat rises to Genny's cheeks, already red with cold. "Just… wondering," she shrugs. "Um… did you have many friends back in Archanea? In the army and such?"

Est wonders where she's leading, but thinks better of questioning it. "A few," she admits. "Weren't many other kids my age in the army, so I mostly just stuck with Palla and Catria."

Genny swallows. "Wh-what about a boyfriend? Or… girlfriend? Did you ever… um… _would_ you ever?"

Est's about to say nah _, never_ , but she stops herself, because that'd be a lie. "Well, no girl's ever asked," she admits. "So I've never had a girlfriend, but I… _guess_ I have a husband, technically…"

The look on Genny's face makes Est regret everything she's said in the past thirty seconds. She looks away, stares at the gravel on the road in front of them. Est grimaces, digging her hands further into her pockets.

"Sorry," she mutters, just out of habit. Genny shakes her head, turning it aside so her hood blocks her face. She reaches up and rubs her eyes. Est can't help but feel she's just changed something.

"I'm happy for you," Genny tells her, but something in her voice sounds strained. "I'm, um— I'm gonna check on Celica. M-make sure her, um, her wrist's healing up alright."

She darts off. Est almost welcomes the buzzing of her thoughts, thought after thought magnifying itself off the edges of her mindscape, an ever-shifting tapestry of noise.

XXI.

When the last battle's won, the Deliverance and the Pilgrimage, reunited, return to Zofia castle. And they have a party— because that's what you do when you've just killed a god. Est's a month to eighteen and things with Genny still aren't the way they used to be, but she hasn't tried much to make them better.

But they're talking again, which is something, and they talk during the party— which seems like it's going to last for the next month. Est leans against the railing of a balcony, idly balancing the heel of her boot against the toe of her other boot. Genny's looking at the ocean in the distance, chin in her hands. The sun's setting, but it's close enough to summer that the night will be warm.

"Pretty view," Est comments, making Genny look up.

Genny smiles, though it looks tired. Genny's seventeenth birthday just passed— in the spring, like Palla's. She's grown into her hands and feet, lost the baby fat in her cheeks and turned the softness in her limbs into lean muscle, grown another few inches (though Est's still a head taller). Est doesn't blame her for looking tired, considering the battle they'd been through.

"I bet you've seen prettier," Genny replies. "On your pegasus."

"Fair point." Est shrugs, and hops up so she's sitting on the balcony railing. Palla would've had a heart attack, given how high up they are, but Palla's off celebrating. She's partially supervising Catria at the party inside, who's trying Zofian ale for the first time and seeming to like it, though Catria's subtly trying to ditch her in order to talk to the cute blonde with the ponytail in another part of the ballroom— the same one Est saw with two boys attempting to ask her to dance at the same time. (The boys in question have since vanished behind a pillar to make out, and are not nearly as undercover as they think they are.)

"I could show you sometime," Est offers. "Pepperjack's got room for two. It may be a little crowded, but we could do it. Maybe not tonight, but…"

Genny hums. She looks back over at Est while fiddling with a signet ring on her forefinger. It's silver and a little big for her fingers, enough so she can twist it around. Est's keen eyes spot the seal of the Zofian royal family— the symbol she keeps seeing everywhere she looks— stamped into the metal.

"Oh, Est," Genny realizes. "Aren't you going back to Archanea soon?"

Est had been trying not to think about that. She fidgets, leaning back almost a dangerous amount before kicking out her feet and pulling herself back onto the balcony.

"I guess so," she finally admits.

"Aren't you looking forward to going home?" Genny asks, brow furrowed. "With your sisters, and… and your husband."

Est's shoulders pull inward just a twinge. She hates to admit it, but she's not looking forward to it— dusting shelves and repainting shutters and weeding tomatoes and cooking meals. Wearing dresses and aprons because otherwise everyone calls her sir. Hauling sheets and linens out to dry in the soft Altean breeze. Scraping at the stubble on her face with a razor blade (because apparently it's a stupid idea to try and shave with the blade of her lance and there's a scar on her chin to prove it). Watching Catria leave on those long scouting missions she does for Macedon and watching Palla go back to Commander Minerva's side like she never even left, and hearing nothing but the world around her bouncing and echoing as background noise that all fades to obsolescence, like everything does.

"Well," Est begins, hopping off the balcony and leaning on the rail with her elbows the way Genny is, "Like I said, it's technically at this point. Since I kinda… left him."

Genny frowns, looking back at her. "Marriage is forever," she says, with the same determination as Est sees when she insist that no matter how bad things get, Sister Gennevuire and ser Astra will always be heroes and know how to come out on top.

Est feels herself wince. "Forever's a real long time," she says.

"But that's what you sign up for when you get married," Genny insists. "It's— it's a promise! Commitment! A-and if you go back on it, it makes you a liar!"

"Yeah, well, maybe I didn't know what I was doing," Est snaps, suddenly irritated. "Maybe I was just a kid who thought I could handle being an adult before I grew up. Maybe I decided I didn't want to stay in the same town with the same man for the rest of my life!"

Her face heats up. What does Genny know, anyway? She's only just seventeen. She doesn't know anything about marriage. All she knows about marriage comes from silly romance novels with happy endings, where marriage means true love and true love is forever.

Genny's eyes widen in surprise. Est's never snapped.

Est feels her anger leave her as quickly as it came. She looks away, focusing on the grain of the wood in the wagon in front of them. Great, she thinks miserably. The one person who can shut out the noise, and Est just snapped at her for no good reason. Nice going, Skylark. (Ser Astra wouldn’t have done this. Ser Astra would never let her best friend be upset.)

"Sorry," she mutters. "Not your fault."

Genny shook her head. "Sorry for calling you a liar," she replies. "But it's— I've always thought it was really romantic. The idea of having someone with you all the time, who'll always come home to you. But I guess that's kind of silly."

There's something forlorn in the way she says always. It's a dream for her, while for Est the idea of being bound to something is scary. Genny wants a commitment, wants something she can rely on. Est can see where she's coming from, and yet the idea makes her stomach turn.

"I get that," Est admits. "It's just— what if you pick wrong? What if you tie yourself to someone for the sake of saying it, and then it turns out it's just a lifelong chore?"

Genny goes quiet. Est can tell she wasn't thinking of that.

“Is that what happened to you?” she asks quietly.

Est leans on the balcony railing. She stares at the distant ocean for a long time— Archanea’s on the other side of that. It’s a nine-hour flight, so they can do it all in one go if they rest beforehand and stock up before they leave, but it’s nine hours of howling sky winds and nothing but ocean. Beats swimming, though.

“I guess it did,” she admits, sounding hoarse. “I was so wrapped up in— in feeling like a woman instead of a kid that I let myself get swept away with the first man that was available. And I don’t even know if he ever really loved me, either, or if he was just doing it because I was so into it and he didn’t have it in him to break my heart. He was a lot older, but he was nice, so I figured, well, that’s what women are supposed to do, right?”

Est shakes her head at her past self. “I was a pretty dumb kid,” she admits. “Should’ve stuck to fishing.”

Genny’s quiet. She fiddles with her signet ring— a gift from Celica, no doubt— while she thinks of what to say. That’s another thing Est likes about her, is that she never speaks without thinking. It reminds Est to take a minute to gather her thoughts, too. Too bad she doesn’t always listen.

“I don’t think you were dumb, per se,” Genny begins. “I mean… you were just a kid.”

“Still,” Est mutters.

“I used to daydream about getting married like that, when I was younger,” Genny says. “About— about meeting somebody with a pretty smile and strong arms that always knew just how to make things okay. Getting swept off my feet by someone kind and understanding, that could take care of me just right, and if I needed something, they’d just— be there, you know? And even if we had to be apart, because we’re doing different things, they’d come back.”

Her voice quavers near the end. Est can tell she’s speaking from the heart, and everything she’s said makes sense given what Est already knows. She sees it in Sister Genevuire, smart and capable and always able to turn a situation around, and in ser Astra, dashing and strong and humble all at the same time. For a moment Est wants to say I’ll come back to you, I want to come back, if it were up to me I wouldn’t leave at all— but she doesn’t.

Genny lets out a humorless chuckle. “Guess we were both pretty dumb kids, huh?”

“We’re still dumb kids,” Est snorts in reply. “I don’t think you stop being a dumb kid until you’re sixty.”

“Sounds alright to me,” Genny decides. “I fought in a war, I think I’ve had enough being grown.”

“That’s good, because I wanna do something dumb kids would do,” Est says, standing up and rolling her shoulders.

Genny looks back at her in amusement, turning around and leaning with her hip on the railing. “And what might that be?” she asks, eyes twinkling. There’s a smile on the soft pink shape of her lips. Her hair’s still brushing her eyes, but she’s opened them wide and let the lowering sunlight light them up, warm and brown and homey. Est falls in love a little more every time she sees their color.

Est licks her lips. I want to kiss you, she thinks. I want to hold you. I want to push your hair from your eyes and kiss you again. I want to sweep you behind a pillar and kiss you until we’re both blue in the face. I want to hide from the world and exist with you even if the sky itself falls.

“I want to dance,” she says. “With you.”  
  
Genny smirks, in that playful little way that lets Est know she’s teasing. (Est loves it when she’s teasing.) “Ask me right and maybe I will.”

Est rolls her eyes, but the smile on her face is too wide to be anything but genuine. So she tosses her hair from her face, straightens her shoulders, and bows deeply, sweepingly. Then she takes Genny’s hand and places a delicate, maidenish kiss upon its back. (Genny giggles— the intended effect.) Est just hopes she doesn’t notice how closely she’s imitating ser Astra.

“Milady,” Est says, hoping she sounds dashing rather than constipated, “Would you do me the _honor_ of this dance?”

Genny’s grinning so wide it’s scrunching up her nose. (It’s one of the cutest things Est’s ever seen.) “Why, good ser Est,” she replies. “I’d be delighted.”

And they dance, badly and stepping all over each other’s feet, and it’s the most perfect thing Est has ever been a part of.

XXII.

Duty calls, eventually. Est’s just glad that it waited until the novelty of the win wore off.

Genny’s there to see them off. It tugs at Est’s heartstrings in a way that makes her want to throw Archanea to the wind and stay with her, just like the heroes in her books. Just like ser Astra.

Her eyes are puffy, but she tightens the scarf around Est’s neck anyway. It was a gift, an early gift for her eighteenth birthday— it’s long and wide and dark green and soft as a whisper. It’s big enough Est can draw it over her head to keep her ears warm. Even in the hot Zofian summer, the fabric feels like a blessing against her cheek. (Though the way she’s blushing will certainly keep her warm in the sky.)

“Fly safe,” she says hoarsely, smiling at Est. “I’ll miss you.”

“I’ll miss you, too,” Est replies. After lingering in awkwardness, she opens her arms. Genny throws herself into them, pressing her face to Est’s quilted flight jacket. She’s so warm— her favorite blue sweater’s tied around her waist despite the season, though the sleeves of her dress are rolled up to her elbows. It’s green and it’s the color of springtime, and the pale blue healer’s smock over it matches her hair almost exactly. _Green and blue,_ Est thinks dimly. She looks good in green and blue.

They break apart. There are tears in Genny’s eyes and Est wants nothing more than to kiss them away.

“I’ll miss hearing your stories,” Est says. “About Sister Gennevuire and ser Astra.”

Genny nods. “I’ll write them all down for you,” she promises. S-so you can read them when you visit! A-and you’ll visit, right?”

“Of course,” Est promises. “As soon as I can, I’ll come back to read them.”

She knows it isn’t good enough, knows Genny needs more than soon, knows she needs now and forever, but loyalty is loyalty and there’s trouble brewing across the pond. She’ll be back, though. She’ll always be back.

The wind whips at Est’s hair when she and her sisters take off. She’ll be back.

XXIII.

Archanea needs them for another few years. Est grows stronger, grows smarter, grows surer. They’re heroes three times over, and yet all she can think about is the noise.

XXX.

Est’s three days past twenty-two, young and strong and looking like the pinnacle of Archanean pegasus knighthood. And yet her stomach turns somersaults like she’s seventeen again, and her hands sweat as she clutches her map with a tiny island town circled in pen, as she clings to Pepperjack’s reins for dear life.

Words race through her mind faster than the wind rushes through her hair— she’s grown it out again, long enough she can tie it back behind her head with a piece of braided twine. For a moment, when she sees the little thatch rooftops of the village, part of her considers backing out and going back to Archanea. Then she tells that part of her to stuff it.

It’s a nice little place— secluded, but not quite isolated, despite the choppy waves of the sea surrounding it. Pastures full of goats and orchards full of fruit halt once they reach the scattered houses, giving way to a little port town with narrow, winding roads and houses that spill over each other like building blocks. Est walks Pepperjack through the sand-covered roads, looking past curious glances from villagers in the hopes of spotting the priory herself. She doesn't, but a couple of nice-looking folks point her down the road, outside of town, towards a crumbling stone building covered with ivy and clover, with a sigil of Mila painted on the door.

She hitches Pepperjack to a fencepost. Her stomach’s still twisting, but she swallows and forces herself to move anyway. Nobody ever got anything done by being a coward, she tells herself firmly, and that gives her the courage to knock.

Words run through her mind, a thousand things she could say and thought of saying on the flight over. But when the door opens and Genny’s there, sweet, lovely Genny in that blue sweater and with her soft hair pulled back from her face with her purple ribbon, there’s nothing in her mind but silence.

Est wants to laugh. Gods, what else did she expect?

Genny’s eyes widen. The sleeves of her sweater are pushed up past her elbows. She holds the skirt of her green dress clear of her shoes, fist holding a handful of it and the faded blue gingham of her apron. There’s rolls of bandages and little vials meant for medicine poking out of her apron pockets, and smears of pencil lead on her fingers and a smudge on her chin. She’s the most beautiful, most welcome sight Est’s ever seen.

“Hey,” Est finally says, cracking a grin. “I’m here to visit.”

“Hey yourself,” Genny replies. Her voice is a balm to Est’s ears. “You grew your hair out.”

Almost self-consciously, Est reaches up to toy with her hair. “You like it? I’m hoping it makes me look more feminine.”

Genny hums thoughtfully. “I kind of liked it short,” she admits. “But I’ve always liked the dashing pixie cut look.”

Est, despite the knot in her throat, finds herself laughing. “Dashing, huh? Like in your stories?”

“Well,” Genny admits, lowering her head, a shy smile curving her lips, “You could say I was inspired. Beautiful pegasus knights are practically begging to have heroes based on them.”

Est’s heart leaps into her throat. “Are they?”

“At least, _I_ think so,” Genny shrugs. “Come on. Ser Astra had to come from _somewhere_ , didn’t she?”

At that Est feels her heart swell. Her arms ache to draw Genny close and hold her again, hold her like they haven’t seen each other in years— which they haven’t. She feels like a foolish, reckless teenager again, thinking about trading kisses in a shared tent and dancing badly on a castle balcony. Her arms, however, remain by her sides.

Genny holds the door open a little further. “Come on in,” she says. “We should catch up.”

“You’re right, you’re right,” Est agrees. “And didn’t I say I’d come back to read your stories?”


End file.
